May 5, 2016

Record Label in a Box has helped people all over the world set up and run their own label, sign emerging artists and kick-start their career in the music industry. In this series of blogs, we’ll highlight RLIAB success stories, which we hope will inspire and educate a new wave of record label owners!

One RLIAB user in particular who has experienced undeniable success is Jordan Owens, founder of SMRI Productions LLC, which was originally established through Ditto Music back in 2011. Jordan and his label are now on an exciting path, with new artists on the books, festival sponsorship deals, private studio space and more.

Jordan Owens talks about his achievements so far with Record Label in a Box

We got in touch with Jordan to find out how he made his Record Label in a Box venture such a success and how other budding label owners can follow in his footsteps.

How did it all start for SMRI Productions?

I was one of the first folks to get a label setup through Ditto way back in 2011 while I was still in college, so there's a lot of history between my record label and eventually getting to this point of having Record Label in a Box, and branching out into other avenues to help creators.

How has your experience with Record Label in a Box been?

Amazing! The company dashboard is a great feature as well as the combination of all the artist contracts we could ever need. RLIAB has really helped give SMRI the proper foundation needed in order for us to really just focus on doing what we love. It also really opened up the vision to where we now are.

RLIAB has allowed us to make artists see that we can offer them the support they need to properly reach the mass media. We now have built a company with which we try to differentiate ourselves by being at the intersection of creation and technology. We have the tools to build a full artist experience from distribution, show booking, social media and even full websites. We actually have three different singles releasing next week from three artists, which is all thanks to our unlimited distribution from RLIAB. Without RLIAB as our foundation and support, we'd never even make it past the first step.

Aside from RLIAB, what’s been the secret to your success?

It takes a team to succeed and I'm not alone. I have three Directors who have specific jobs and contribute greatly. We're not paying each other yet, but we're certainly slowly building a decent start-up to be proud of.

I serve as the president of the company, Bryan Smith as the Lead Software Engineer, Kenssy Quezada as Director of Media and Skyler Burgess as Director of Studio. Usually, we're all in some different geographic location so we have set up our own team on Slack and use Dropbox for mass file sharing in order to operate as a business.

We heard your label is sponsoring a festival later this year?

Yes! SMRI Productions will be sponsoring the first-ever HillFest, a festival that is going to be held in Hillsville, VA from September 2nd to 4th during Labor Day weekend.

Over 400k people come to the Hillsville area that weekend annually as there is a famous flea market there every year, thus, the reasoning behind the scheduling of the festival. There will be transportation from the flea market grounds to the festival, and back as well with tents for vendors and small artist showcases in both areas as well.

How did you get involved with HillFest?

I actually found out about HillFest via the opportunities calendar within the RLIAB dashboard, reached out to the festival organisers Parnell Productions via Twitter, and eventually we traded a few emails and then phone calls. What turned out as me originally getting one of my artists booked turned into a sponsorship opportunity.

We're helping sponsor the event, and we will have our own tent and artist showcases going all weekend long. We are also working closely with Parnell to help them out with our bread and butter, which is media creation in order to assist them with cost, and really give the festival the unique image it deserves.

Do you have any artists performing at the festival?

We will have two artists performing there. The first is Josiah Atchley from Knoxville, TN. We have released his EP, Scoundrel, via Ditto Music and will be releasing a single and full LP this year. He will be a headlining artist on the Friday night of the festival. Josiah also recently received a call from Bonnaroo and he's booked for that festival now as well!

The second is Kara Beth, a new artist we just picked up last month. We will be releasing a single and EP in the coming months with her, and are recording and producing a full-length album from our studio here in Roanoke, VA.

I also put an independent artist, Annabelle's Curse from Bristol, VA in touch with the festival organisers as well and they will be a headlining act too. I'm willing to help out artists with which I technically have no business affiliation if it means producing a first-class festival – and that's what we're going to do.

SMRI Productions artist Josiah Atchley has been booked to play at Bonnaroo Festival 2016!

What have been your proudest achievements with Record Label in a Box so far?

We've been able to build our own studio, rehearsal space, and offer any type of supporting service you can imagine for artists. We even let a band – Deaf Rhino – stay at our housing during their tour stop here for the Down by Downtown Conference here in Roanoke, VA. It's our way to finally being able to give back to the artists in our area and really start to grow something here.

Jordan did it, so why can't you? CLICK HERE to find out how you can set up your own label with Record Label in a Box and start your career in the music industry!

Do have your own RLIAB success story to share? If so, get in touch at rliab@dittomusic.com and we could feature your achievements in a future blog.

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